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China uses the metric system in weights and measures, and its earlier system is still widely used in some areas. The following is a conversion table.
Each year China welcomes thousands of English-speaking students, teachers, scientists, artists, business men and women, and tourists who come to China to study, teach, perform, exchange ideas, engage in trade and business or just to sightsee. The following offers a fast and ready reference of basic China facts as a guide for visitors and others.
Formal name: People's Republic of China (PRC)
Capital: Beijing
Head of State: President Hu Jintao elected March 15, 2003.
National flag: Red flag with five stars.
National emblem: Tiananmen Gatetower under five stars, encircled by ears of grain and with a gear wheel below.
Other symbols:
Animal: The giant panda is considered a Chinese national treasure. Just over 1,000 survive in the wild, most of them to be found in Sichuan Province.
Flower: China does not have an ?official? national flower, but the tree peony can be regarded as a national favorite. The tree peony (mudan) received the most votes in an unofficial survey conducted in 1994 in every district in China asking people to select a national flower.
Bird: More bird species live in China than any other place in the world. Shaanxi Province?s red ibis is also a national treasure. Only some 1,500 of this highly endangered bird species exist. Other cranes found in China include the Siberian white, common, black-necked, sarus, hooded, white-naped, and demoiselle.
Tree: The oldest tree in the world is China?s gingko, which first appeared during the Jurassic Age some 160 million years ago.
National anthem: March of the Volunteers, written in 1935, with lyrics by the poet Tian Han and music by the composer Nie Er, honoring those who went to the front to fight the Japanese invaders in northeast China in the 1930s. Decided upon as the provisional national anthem of the new China on September 27, 1949, at the First Plenary Session of the Chinese People?s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), the song was officially adopted as the national anthem of the PRC on December 4, 1982, by the National People?s Congress (NPC).
National Day: Chinese celebrate October 1 as National Day in honor of the founding of the People?s Republic of China on October 1, 1949.
Other national holidays: Spring Festival (the celebration of Chinese New Year, generally between the last 10-day period of January and mid-February) and International Labor Day (May 1). Major holidays in China are occasions for family reunions and traveling. Starting in October 1999, China?s three official holidays became ?Golden Weeks? each with seven days vacation made possible by working four extra days before the commencement of the holiday and afterwards.
Land size: China has a landmass of 9,600,000 sq km, and is the third-largest country in the world, next only to Russia and Canada. Cultivated land is 130.04 million ha.
Location: In the east of the Asian continent, on the western shore of the Pacific Ocean.
Border countries: Korea, Mongolia, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tadzhikistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam.
Climate: Extremely diverse; tropical in the south to subarctic in the north.
Geography: Mountains, high plateaus, and deserts in the west; plains, deltas, and hills in the east. The highest mountain in China is the highest mountain in the world: Mount Qomolangma. The mountain towers above all others at 29,035 feet or 8,848 m.
Population: China is the world?s most populous country with 1.28453 billion at the end of 2002, one-fifth of the world?s total. This figure does not include the Chinese living in the Hong Kong and Macao special administrative regions, and Taiwan Province.
Population density: The population density is 134 people per sq km, roughly four times greater than that of the U.S.
Population ethnicity: 91.6 percent of Chinese people are Han. The non-Han population includes 55 ethnic minorities, of which the major groups are the Zhuang, Manchu, Hui, Miao, Uygur, Yi, Tujia, Mongolian, and Tibetan.
Population distribution: Most of the population of China lives in the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River, Yangtze River and Pearl River valleys, and the Northeast Plain. In 2000 a ?go-west? campaign was launched by the government to help its relatively backward western and central areas catch up with more affluent eastern China.
Religions: The number of religious worshippers in China is estimated at well over 100 million, most of whom follow Buddhism. Other major religions are Taoism, Islam and Christianity in both its Catholic and Protestant forms.
Languages: Standard Chinese or Mandarin (Putonghua, based on the Beijing dialect), Yue (Cantonese), Wu (Shanghaiese), Minbei (Fuzhou), Minnan (Hokkien-Taiwanese), Xiang, Gan, and Hakka dialects, as well as minority languages. In 1958, the First National People?s Congress approved, at its Fifth Session, the adoption of the Pinyin (Scheme for the Chinese Phonetic Alphabet) for spelling Chinese names and places in Roman letters, but the Pinyin system was not popularly used until the late 1970s. Pinyin is now widely seen in China, and it replaces earlier Romanization spelling systems.
Health: China provides wide access to primary health care and child immunizations. Average life expectancy was 71.8 years in 2002, having risen from 35 years on the eve of Liberation in 1949.
Economy: China?s economy has boomed since 1978, as a result of sweeping economic reforms. GNP grew from $128 billion in 1980 to $745 billion in 1998. China?s economy continues to grow rapidly, with a GDP real growth rate of 8 percent in 2002, and an annual industrial production growth rate of 11.6 percent between 1979 and 2000.
The Constitution: After the founding of the PRC, four Constitutions have been formulated successively in 1954, 1975, 1978 and 1982. The first Constitution was adopted by the First Session of the First National People?s Congress, the chief legislative branch, on September 20, 1954. The present Constitution was promulgated in 1982 and amended several times thereafter, in 1988, 1993 and 1999.
Political parties: The Communist Party of China (CPC) is the country?s sole political party in power. Hu Jintao became general secretary of the CPC at its 16th National Congress in November 2002. Founded in July 1921, the CPC today has more than 66 million members and over 3.5 million basic organizations. Besides the CPC, there are eight political parties.
Administrative divisions: China is made up of 23 provinces, five autonomous regions, four municipalities directly under the Central Government, and the special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macao. The 23 provinces are Anhui, Fujian, Gansu, Guangdong, Guizhou, Hainan, Hebei, Heilongjiang, Henan, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Jilin, Liaoning, Qinghai, Shaanxi, Shandong, Shanxi, Sichuan, Taiwan, Yunnan, Zhejiang; the five autonomous regions are Guangxi, Inner Mongolia, Ningxia, Xinjiang, and Tibet; the four municipalities are Beijing, Chongqing, Shanghai and Tianjin.
Currency: Renminbi (RMB)/yuan
Military: The People?s Liberation Army (PLA) includes the Army, Navy, Air Force, and the Second Artillery Force. Jiang Zemin is chairman of the Central Military Commission of China, the country?s top military organ and commander of its armed forces.
International organization participation: The African Development Bank Group, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), ASEAN Regional Forum, Asian Development Bank, Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Bank for International Settlement, China Development Bank, United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, International Atomic Energy Agency, International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, International Civil Aviation Organization, International Chamber of Commerce, International Development Association, International Fund for Agricultural Development, International Finance Corporation, International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, International Hydrographic Organization, International Labor Organization, International Monetary Fund (IMF), International Maritime Organization, International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL), International Olympic Committee, International Standardization Organization (ISO), International Telecommunication Union, Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, United Nations, UN Security Council, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, United Nations Industrial Development Organization, UN Iraq-Kuwait Observation Mission, UN Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea, UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission, UN Truce Supervision Organization, United Nations University, World Health Organization, World Intellectual Property Organization, World Meteorological Organization, World Tourism Organization, and World Trade Organization.
Brief Introduction
China is the most populous country in the world, with 1.27627 billion people at the end of 2001, one fifth of the world's total. This figure does not include the Chinese living in the Hong Kong and Macao special administrative regions, and Taiwan Province.
China: Population Density
Moreover, the population density is high, with 133 people per sq km. This population, however, is unevenly distributed. Along the densely populated east coast there are more than 400 people per sq km; in the central areas, over 200; and in the sparsely populated plateaus in the west there are less than 10 people per sq km.
The following table gives an overall view of the composition of the population of China (2001):
Composition of Population (%)
Sex: male 51.63 / female 48.37
Region: cities and towns 36.22 / countryside 63.78
Age: below 14 years old 22.89 / 15-64 years old 70.15 / above 65 years old 6.96
Targets and Principals
Main guidelines for tackling the population and development issue: Taking into consideration its basic national conditions, including large population, inadequate per-capita resources and low level of economic and scientific development, China would persistently follow its own path in tackling the issue of population and development. It would draw on other countries' managerial expertise and scientific achievement and tackle its own population and development issue in accordance with its own specific conditions. China would persistently follow its sustainable development strategy and bring about a coordinated development of population, economy, society, resources and environment so as to realize national modernization with comprehensive human development. It would combine the universal principle of human rights with its national conditions, give top priority to the rights to subsistence and development, and facilitate the people's enjoyment of a higher standard of basic rights and freedom in civil, political, economic, social and cultural areas. China respects different cultural background, religious beliefs, and moral concepts. Taking into full consideration the unity between priorities and conditions, rights and obligations, China has formulated and implemented population and development plans and policies to ensure that all social members enjoy an equal opportunity for development.
By 2005, China is to have its population within 1.33 billion (excluding the population of the Hong Kong and Macao Special Administrative Regions and Taiwan Province). Comprehensive medical and reproductive health services are to be offered. Informed choice of contraceptive measures is practiced. The maternal mortality rate is to be reduced to 42 per 100,000. By 2010, China is to have its population within 1.4 billion and the Chinese people will lead a much better life with an obvious improvement of its population quality. By the mid-21st century, the total population would reach its peak of 1.6 billion, to be followed by a gradual decrease. The population quality and health level would have an overall improvement, with senior high school education and higher education popularized nationwide.
The Giant Panda of China is one of the rarest animals in the world. Giant pandas live in remote high mountains in Sichuan, Shaanxi and Gansu Provinces and eat bamboo. They are a surviving species of the Fourth Ice Age and are known as a "living fossil". They are regarded as China's "national treasure".
Genus and Species
Ailuropoda melanoleuca
Family
Ursidae
Order
Carnivora
The Giant Panda is a large sturdy bear-like mammal with a very thick woolly black and white coat. The ears, eye patches, legs and shoulders are black and the rest of the body is white. The nose is black. The forepaws have an extended pad on the sole and on the first digit to assist in climbing and grasping bamboo. Giant pandas stand between two and three feet tall at the shoulder (on all four legs), and reach four to six feet long. Males are larger than females, weighing up to 250 pounds in the wild. Females rarely reach 220 pounds.
Although it has a body like a carnivore, closely related to the bear family, Giant Panda specializes in mainly vegetarian diet, consisting mainly of the shoots and roots of bamboo. They sometimes eat other plants such as horsetails and pine bark. They also occasionally eat carcasses and catch small animals.
They inhabit in mountain forests with dense stands of bamboo, at an elevation of between 1400 and 3500 meters, but descending as low as 800 meters in winter. They live mostly on the ground but are good tree climbers, often sheltering in hollow trees, rock crevasses and caves.
The Giant Panda is mostly shy and nocturnal. They are solitary, with individual home ranges of about 2.5 square kilometers, but they share the surrounding areas with other individuals. During the mating season they may expand the sizes of their ranges. They mark their trails with scent from an anal gland. Adult giant pandas are generally solitary, but they do communicate periodically through scent marks, calls, and occasional meetings.
Scientists are not sure how long giant pandas live in the wild, but they are sure it is shorter than lifespan in zoos. Chinese scientists have reported zoo pandas as old as 35.
The giant panda is listed as endangered in the World Conservation Union's (IUCN's) Red List of Threatened Animals. There are about 1,000 left in the wild. About 140 pandas live in zoos and breeding centers around the world, mostly in China.
